Sunday, an anti-jihadist event of worldwide significance took place in Paris.

Nearly four million people took to the streets of Paris to condemn two incidents of barbarous murders by Islamic extremists. The first was a January 7 attack by three heavily armed men on the office of an iconoclastic magazine, known for its lack of reverence toward any person or institution, including Islam. In that attack, 14 people were killed. The second incident ended in the murder of four hostages held by a gunman, who was himself eventually killed by police, in a nearby Vincennes Kosher supermarket.

The reaction of the French people, their leaders and the leaders of the countries of Europe and many in the Middle East was an extraordinary demonstration of condemnation and outrage. A spontaneous march of as many as 4 million people marched through the streets of Paris, led by a massive phalanx of political leaders from around the world, with arms linked and faces grim. Photos captured on the scene show French President Francois Hollande flanked by Mali President Donald Tusk and Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel, along with 40 other heads of state. Especially notable are Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on the same side against terrorism.

The significance of this event is enormous: It is the first massive outpouring of rejection and resistance to the threats of Islamic terrorism on the part of the civilized peoples of the world. There was no mistaking what the millions of French people were saying: This was a massive defense of the freedom of speech, and of the “equality, liberty and brotherhood” (the slogan of French freedoms) which are required to fight and defeat this new threat to civilization. Even in a traditional stronghold of anti-Semitism, which France has often in the past been associated with, there were signs carried proudly stating the “We are all Jews”, a reference of course to the kosher market assault.

This day proves that the French “get it” — understand the nature of the threat of Islamic terrorists, and are united in their determination to defeat it.

But where were the Americans? Nowhere to be seen. Where was the American television coverage of the Paris phenomenon? Limited. American television was much more concerned with football and business as usual than with a definitive defiance of terrorism on behalf of the civilized people of the world.

Were our president, our vice president, and our secretary of state performing some highly important duties which kept them from leading this insurrection of the civilized? Actually, the president and vice president took the day off — “No public schedule today”. Who knows (or cares) where John Kerry was? Eric Holder, the U.S Attorney General, is the Obama administration’s emissary to the French. With his usual sense of the appropriate, Mr. Holder skipped the whole event.

In general, then, it must be concluded that the leader of the “free world” was not leading Sunday. In fact, it seems fitting and symbolic that the United States of America was not leading the first popular demonstration of the West against the Islamic Terrorists. It is fitting because the leader of the United States of America doesn’t believe there is such a thing as a war on terror.

He and his pals have laid down requirements for sequestration of funds which are gradually stripping our military of its capacity to defend our homeland. They have declared our wars abroad over, even though the enemy has neither surrendered nor been defeated. They have apparently been blindsided by the cyber-attack on Sony with all its sinister implications for the rest of us. And they are even now negotiating with Iran, a major state sponsor of terrorism, in a most conciliatory fashion. Our president, unlike the French, doesn’t “get it.”

Not all of this ignoring of the most dangerous threat of our time can be laid at the feet of the president. Codefendants are our media who are spending their time speculating about an election which is almost two years away rather reporting about America’s efforts to overcome cyber-attacks, Russian aggression in Eastern Europe, and particularly the world-wide movement of ideologues who are dedicated to killing infidels. The terrorist incidents in Boston, Canada, Australia, Pakistan, the United kingdom and France are not unrelated to those in Somalia, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Palestine in the Middle East, as well as in Africa, especially northern Nigeria (perhaps the most ruthless of all, the Boca Haram), Libya, and Egypt. This is a global movement against anything perceived as “infidel” – Christian, Jewish, democratic, capitalist, or secular.

The Americans lack not only recognition of the nature and locations of this threat, but also any sort of strategy to achieve its “degradation and destruction,” as our president declared somewhat quixotically.

Ultimately, the defeat of this religious fervor will depend on the Islamic population itself. Perhaps the most effective, and certainly the bravest, man in Islam last week gave us the key to a successful outcome to this war. In a little reported speech, Egypt’s new president, Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi, speaking to a group of imams celebrating the birth of Mohamed said, “You, imams, are responsible before Allah. The entire world … is waiting for your next move … because [the Islamic world] is being torn, it is being destroyed, it is being lost — and it is being lost by our own hands.” (Newsmax, 1/11/2015) Anwar Sadat, a predecessor of Mr. el-Sisi, was assassinated by radical Islamists in 1979 for making peace with Israel. Mr. el-Sisi thus knowingly takes his life in his hands whenever he delivers this message.

As a rising military dictator, Mr. el-Sisi’s moral authority is open to debate, but his message is one which must be heard and heeded by Islamic leaders if the West is ever to win this ideological war. Victory lies in a well-organized and unified opposition by the West and its allies in combination with the emergence of an alternative view of Islam.

But the Americans will stay in the shadows as long as we have this President, or until we suffer another 9/11 disaster.